Critical Pedagogy in Classroom Discourse Loukia K
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University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Faculty Publications: Department of Teaching, Department of Teaching, Learning and Teacher Learning and Teacher Education Education 2015 Critical Pedagogy in Classroom Discourse Loukia K. Sarroub University of Nebraska-Lincoln, [email protected] Sabrina Quadros University of Nebraska-Lincoln Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/teachlearnfacpub Part of the Bilingual, Multilingual, and Multicultural Education Commons, Curriculum and Instruction Commons, Curriculum and Social Inquiry Commons, Disability and Equity in Education Commons, Other Education Commons, Other Teacher Education and Professional Development Commons, and the Social and Philosophical Foundations of Education Commons Sarroub, Loukia K. and Quadros, Sabrina, "Critical Pedagogy in Classroom Discourse" (2015). Faculty Publications: Department of Teaching, Learning and Teacher Education. 156. http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/teachlearnfacpub/156 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Teaching, Learning and Teacher Education at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Publications: Department of Teaching, Learning and Teacher Education by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. Published (as Chapter 19) in The Routledge Handbook of Educational Linguistics, edited by Martha Bigelow and Johanna Ennser-Kananen (New York & Abingdon: Routledge, 2015), pp. 252–260. digitalcommons.unl.edu Copyright © 2015 Taylor & Francis. Used by permission. Critical Pedagogy in Classroom Discourse Loukia K. Sarroub and Sabrina Quadros Historical Perspectives The classroom is a unique discursive space for the enactment of critical pedagogy. In some ways, all classroom discourse is critical because it is inherently political, and at the heart of critical pedagogy is an implicit understanding that power is negotiated daily by teachers and students. Historically, critical pedagogy is rooted in schools of thought that have emphasized the individual and the self in relation and in contrast to society, sociocultural and ideologi- cal forces, and economic factors and social progress. In addressing conceptualizations in Or- thodox Marxism (with Karl Marx, Max Weber, and Emile Durkheim) in the mid-19th cen- tury and the Frankfurt School (with Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Herbert Marcuse, Friedrich Pollock, Leo Lowenthal, and Walter Benjamin), contemporary critical theory still embodies the concept of false consciousness, the idea that institutional processes and material mislead people, and the internalization of values and norms, which induce people to act and behave according to what it is expected in society (Agger 1991). The problem of domination (which cannot be reduced to oppression, nor is it akin to it), a complex understanding of how social structures mediate power relations to create different forms of alienation (Morrow and Brown 1994), mainly depicts the reproduction of social struggles, inequities, and power differ- ences, reflecting some of the main aspects of critical pedagogy classrooms. In considering such critical theory in classroom settings, Giroux and McLaren (1989) ac- knowledge the importance of teachers and students understanding classroom pedagogical practices as a form of ideological production, wherein the classroom reflects discursive forma- tions and power-knowledge relations, both in schools and in society. Within these conceptual- izations, Livingstone (1987), referring to Freire (1970), refers to critical theory in classrooms as a critical pedagogy of practice, claiming the concept as a radical perspective in which “in- tellectuals engage in social change to make the political more pedagogical and the pedagogi- cal more political” (xii). In such terms, the “political more pedagogical” calls for a redefinition of historical memory (which, in critical theory, is the basis for the understanding of cultural struggles), critique, and radical utopianism, as the elements of a political discourse highlight- ing pedagogical processes, such as knowledge being constructed and deconstructed, dialogue being contextualized around emancipatory interests, and learning being actively pursued in radical practices of ethics and political communities. In making the “pedagogical more 252 C RITI C AL P EDAGOGY IN C LASSROOM D IS C OURSE 253 political,” Freire (1970) refers to a more profound idea of schooling in order to embrace the broader category of education in the forms of critically examining the production of subjects and subjectivities that take place outside of school settings and developing a radical critical teaching in which educators are able to examine how different public settings interact in shap- ing the ideological and material conditions that contribute to sites of domination and struggle. Theoretically, critical pedagogy in classroom discourse embodies the practice of engaging students in the social construction of knowledge, which grounds its pillars on power relations. In utilizing critical pedagogy in the classroom, teachers must question their own practices in the process to construct knowledge and why the main knowledge is legitimized by the dom- inant culture. Moreover, through emancipatory knowledge (Habermas 1981) educators draw practical and technical knowledge together, creating a space for understanding the relations of power and privilege that manipulate and distort social relationships. In the end, participants in critical pedagogy classrooms are encouraged to engage in collective action, founded on the principles of social justice, equality, and empowerment (McLaren 2009). One example of the application of the theory in classroom contexts in which English is taught as a foreign language directs the concept of critical pedagogy to a narrower, but no less powerful, dismantling of power structural systems of imposition and false consciousness. Pen- nycook (1989, 2006) and Canagarajah (1999, 2007) examine the role of English as a foreign lan- guage, which embodies political ideological assumptions in international classrooms. Accord- ing to Pennycook (1989), educators need to understand local political configurations in order to know whether a particular language policy is “reactionary or liberatory” (112). Theorists in for- eign language teaching (Phillipson 1988; Canagarajah 1999; 2007; Pennycook 1989; 2006) argue that the political imposition of English as a foreign language interferes with the vitality of local multilingualism due to the hegemonic status of English (in Canagarajah 1999, 208). Considering the harmful effects of linguistic influence, Phillipson (1988) and Canagarajah (2007) cite two instances of struggle for local communities where English is the imposed for- eign language. The first instance is the dependence and subjugation of the third world and, sec- ond, the values of the industrial consumerism culture, which reflect aspects of capitalist societies and countries that maintain the status of global, powerful structures. Pennycook (1989) comple- ments such claims by arguing that the international spread of English historically has paralleled the spread of Western cultural norms of international business and technological standardiza- tion. Peirce (1989) also argues that we need to expand our views of language as “neutral,” since “English, like all other languages, is a site of struggle over meaning, access, and power” (405). Regarding these assumptions of subjugation of the third world, industrial consumerism, the cultural norms of international business and technological standardization, and struggle over meaning, access, and power, critical pedagogy practitioners approach English as a tool to engage participants in larger ideological discourses, promoting agency and knowledge, not only about the learning of the structural aspects of becoming fluent in the language, but, and more impor- tantly, how such a language influences their immediate reality and communities. In literacy studies, the discourse of critical pedagogy embodies the emancipatory force that challenges the idea of literacy as not being politically neutral, observing that with liter- acy comes perspectives and interpretations that are ultimately political (Gee 2008). In using literacy as a skill to prepare individuals to “read the word” and “read the world” (in Freirean terms), classroom discourse adds to the idea of learning the ability to decipher symbols and acquire the academic language to empower participants in their contexts, calling educators to open spaces for marginalized students to voice their struggles in political, social, and eco- nomic spheres. Freire (1985) defends the idea that literacy in itself does not empower those who live in oppressive conditions, but it must be linked to a critical understanding of the social 254 S ARROUB & Q UADROS IN R OUTLEDGE H ANDBOOK OF E DUCATIONAL L INGUISTICS (2015) context and action to change such conditions. In these terms, Auerbach (1995) refers to criti- cal literacies as the “rhetoric of strengths’” (644) for focusing on cultural sensitivity, celebra- tion of diversity, and empowerment of parents, and she also highlights that empowerment is not regarded in individual terms but in social terms (655). An essential aspect of critical peda- gogy in literacy learning includes the ongoing recognition of the power relationships amongst individuals who are involved in education,